Enduring Lies: The Rwandan Genocide in the Propaganda System, 20 Years Later

by Edward S. Herman, David Peterson

The Rwandan genocide of 1994 has been called the “fastest, most efficient killing spree of the twentieth century. In 100 days, some 800,000 Tutsi and politically moderate Hutu were murdered. The United States did almost nothing to try to stop it” (U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power, writing in 2002). In their book, Enduring Lies: The Rwandan Genocide in the Propaganda System, 20 Year Later (The Real News Books), Edward S. Herman and David Peterson challenge these beliefs. With sections devoted to “The ‘Rwandan Genocide’ by the Numbers,” the Tutsi-led Rwandan Patriotic Front’s October 1990 invasion of Rwanda from Uganda and Paul Kagame’s ensuing 46-month war of conquest, the April 6, 1994 shoot-down of the Hutu President Juvénal Habyarimana’s jet on its return to Kigali, universally regarded as the event that triggered the mass bloodshed which followed, the mythical Hutu “conspiracy to commit genocide” against the country’s minority Tutsi population, the West’s alleged “failure to intervene” to stop the killings, Kagame Power’s triumph in Rwanda and its spread to the neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo, with a death toll running in the millions, and to the pernicious role played by the U.S., U.K., and Canadian governments, as well as by the United Nations, human rights groups, the media and intellectuals in promulgating a false history of 1994 Rwanda, the authors cross-examine what they call the “standard model” of the Rwandan genocide. “A brilliant dissection of the Western propaganda system on Rwanda,” writes Christopher Black, a Canadian attorney and the lead defense counsel before the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

Genres: Politics, History, Africa, Nonfiction

144 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 20, 2014

About the author

Edward S. Herman was an economist and media analyst with a specialty in corporate and regulatory issues as well as political economy and the media. He was Professor Emeritus of Finance at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. He also taught at Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania. He received his Bachelor of Arts from University of Pennsylvania in 1945 and PhD in 1953 from the University of California, Berkeley.

-wikipedia

Reviews

[Abe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Useful intro to the “revisionist” narrative with respect to the RPF and overall a deeply unsettling read. Features much of Herman’s impressive research skills along side some of his somewhat irritating tendencies towards overstatement. The section dealing with the genocide fax in particular seems to hasty, I’m not really sold on the idea that the discrepancy he describes is all that dramatic (and this discrepancy is the purported basis for treating the doc presented as being possibly doctored in some way). I think he should’ve discussed the US role a bit more as well it would shore up his argument. I’ve just started Judi Revers In Praise of Blood and already it feels like she’s done a better job at establishing the US role in and motives for supporting the RPF. In general though it is a strong work and marshals a ton of evidence in its favor and is deeply depressing.

[Lies Verlinden · Rating 5 out of 5]

First book to put forward a convincing critique of the onesidedness of the victimisation and the strategy behind the genocide. Very unsettling to unveil the propaganda that still lives on today, but fascinating and interesting .